The Howling
by SanadaSayuri
Summary: Blood can never justify the sins of a Holy War, but when the War reaches Heaven's Gate, difficult choices are made. Time passes, but the memory of old pain remains, and all that is left is memory. Yet memory is a poor substitute for the reunion of lovers.
1. 1 of 3: The Hand of Sorrow

Title: The Howling  
Author: Sanada Sayuri  
Summary: Blood can never justify the sins of a Holy War, but when the War reaches Heaven's Gate, difficult choices are made.  
Prompt #26: End

**Chapter 1: The Hand of Sorrow**

**"W**e can't be together anymore."

Byakuya felt his heart stop beating at his lover's words.

"What?" he gasped. Byakuya took a step toward the teen and stopped, hurt, as the teen took a step back, away from him. "Ichigo? Why?"

Byukuya found that he couldn't read the teen, though his face was warm and his voice was even. Ichigo's reryoku, unlike, usual, gave away none of his thoughts or emotions, and his body language was unreadable.

"All you need to know," the teen said, sounding distinctly unlike his normal self, "I cannot love you any more."

Byakuya's eyes widened. "What are you talking about, Ichigo?" he pleaded, "What is wrong?"

"You are a noble and a shinigami Captain," I chigo said, "and I am amortal human. Our remaining lovers could only hurt the both of us."

"Ichigo," Byakuya pleaded, "please! If it was something I did..."

"You did nothing," Ichigo interrupted. "This is simply how it must be."

"Don't leave me!"

"Impossible," the teen's Voice was crisp. "We cannot stay together. Good bye, KuchikiByakuya taicho."

Byakuya could only watch as the teen shunted away. "Ichigo," he whispered as he felt the swell of power that accompanied the activation of the Senkaimon. He stood still at the top of Soukyouku Hill and stared out in the direction of the Senkaimon as the spicy tang of his one-time-lover's reiryouku vanished from his senses.

~*~*~*~

tbc...


	2. 2 of 3: The Cross

Title: The Howling  
Author: Sanada Sayuri  
Summary: Blood can never justify the sins of a Holy War, but when the War reaches Heaven's Gate, difficult choices are made. Time passes, but the memory of old pain remains, and all that is left is memory.  
Pairings: Byaichi  
Prompt #32: Alone

**Chapter 2: The Cross**

**A**s Byakuya passed on leadership of the Kuchiki family to Rukia, and the Captaincy of the Sixth Division to Renji, he felt a pang of grief cut his heart. It had been 300 years since his lover had left him and had Vanished without a trace. **HE** should be here today, Byakuya thought, **HE** would have been happy for me. the raven haired noble reached into the sleeve of has shihakusho and drew out a small bundle wrapped in silk. He carefully undid the knots allowing the pale colored cloth to fall away, revealing delicate red links shimmering in the light As Byakuya gently stroked the red links, he remembered how he had come into possession of his former lover's sword belt...

_Byakuya had stood on Soukyouku Hill for what seemed like a small eternity when a bell had rung, signaling the start of an emergency senior Officer's meeting. The raven haired noble swallowed hard, and composedhimself. Once he had his emotions under control, he made his way toward the First Division there, the gathered officers were introduced to Hikifune, once the Twelfth Division Captain, but now a Royal Guard._

"The High King has gone to war," Hikifune said. "He has sent for the Substitute Shinigami, Kurosaki Ichigo to lead his forces into Hueco Mundo. The High King bids the Gotei 13 to continue to fulfilltheir normal duties and to remain outside of Hueco Mundo so the Royal Twelfth Division can keep track of what takes place."

With her message delivered, Hikifune vanished. The Sotaicho ordered that the High King's demands be adhered to and dismissed the meeting. Byakuya had returned to his home in a daze, and found in his room, the swordbelt neatly coiled with a note that read, "I'm sorry."

Time had passed slowly, and then a year passed and Hikifune made a second appearance.

"The High King is dead." she said, "The Crown Prince has ascended the throne and the Royal Grandson is now Crown Prince. Las Noches has been razed to the ground and Tousen and Ichimaru are dead."

another year passed and Hikifune made a third appearence.

"The High King has passed away," she said. "His Majesty died killing the former Gotei 13 Fifth Division Captain, the Traitor Aizen Sousuke. The Crown Prince has ascended the throne."

No word was spoken about Kurosaki Ichigo. All anyone could assume was that he was dead. Byakuya gently folded the cloth over the sword belt and slipped it back into his sleeve. As Byakuya dressed in the red uniform of the Royal Guard, he thought about the little gifts that had appeared in his room over the past 300 years. Byakuya couldn't help but think that this was how the High King was trying to make up to him for getting his lover killed. Byakuya scoffed. Ichigo's romantic notions were rubbing off on him if he we honestly thinking such ridiculous thoughts.

Byakuya glanced at the kenseikan and the scarf he'd worn for the better part of four hundred years. He sighed. He wished Ichigo was here Now that he was no longer a noble, and would be only Byakuya. He picked up a locket, one he had commissioned for Ichigo's eighteenth birthday, and slipped it over his head. It had been left on his desk in his office the day the news of Aizen's death had been broken. Byakuya sighed as he slipped Senbonzakura into his obi and moved toward the door. He paused and looked around the mostly empty room. His belongings were mostly in storage now and only the bare necessities and some things of sentimental value had been moved to his new quarters in the barracks of the Sky Palace. Byakuya sighed as he left the room. He could almost imagine that Ichigo was urging him to stop being silly and to take the next step into his new future. But it wasn't so, Byakuya thought as he made his way toward the Senkaimon. Ichigo wasn't there. He wouldn't ever be there again. He was alone. His lover had left him behind a long time ago. With no other choice, Byakuya could only move forward, and there was no one but him to care that Ichigo wasn't there, that he had to meet his new future alone.

tbc...


	3. 3 of 3: The Heart of Everything

Title: The Howling  
Author: Sanada Sayuri  
Summary: Blood can never justify the sins of a Holy War, but when the War reaches Heaven's Gate, difficult choices are made. Time passes, but the memory of old pain remains, and all that is left is memory. Yet memory is a poor substitute for the reunion of lovers.  
Pairings: Byaichi  
Prompt #24: Reunion

**Chapter 3: The Heart of Everything**

**K**uchiki Byakuya's transition ceremony was performed alone, very much like the ceremonies of the Royal Guards before him, and like the previous ceremonies, it was a bittersweet triumph. Byakuya was not the first Royal Guard to perform the ceremony, while wishing that his lover was there and he would not be the last.

Even as he walked the streets of Seireitei, Byakuya could see the shadow of his lover everywhere. He remembered how Ichigo's successes became Soul Society's successes, his grievences became Soul Society's grievences, and over the course of the war, Kurosaki Ichigo became Soul Society's little baby, a Shinigami with great potential who threw all his will into everything he did because of the shadow of death and the potential loss of his memories hung over him at all times. Every shinigami in Soul Society had looked forward to seeing Ichigo's growth and over the course of the war, Byakuya thought as his steps brought him past the Fourth Division, they had come to be terribly protective of Ichigo, with Unohana being the worst of the lot.

Where once Duty had been the heart of soul Society, Ichigo had become the heart of the Shinigai's extended family. He looked up toward a window, one he knew led to Unohana's office, and he saw the serene faced Captain raise a hand in both salutation and farewell. Byakuya responded by raising his own hand silently, thinking all the while of the day when Unohana had dragged him to her office for a full body physical that later ended with his being tied to a chair while the other senior officers interrogated him about his intentions toward Ichigo. He'd never told Ichigo about how terror had threatened to consume him when he realized that former captains were present and glowering at him also. Byakuya blinked away tears and allowed his hand o fall to his side and he kept walking, all too aware of Unohana's concerned eyes on his back.

It was exactly sunset when he arrived at the Senkaimon, where he was greeted by a Royal Guard who had a black badge on her left arm with the number one carved beneath a dragon. She stood there, surveying him with cool green eyes, and held out her hand. Byakuya hesitated for a moment and placed his hand in hers and kneeled, bowing his head in respect as cool fingers curled around his hand.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

"Kuchiki Byakuya," she said, " Former Gotei 13 Captain of the Sixth Divsion. Your initiation into the ranks of the Royal Guard is nearly complete. From here on in, until your formal initiation by the High King, you may neither speak nor make any sound. To do so is to forfeit the right to enter the direct service of the High King. You have shed your past ties to the Gotei 13. Now shed the voice of the Gotei 13's Comander General so when next you speak, you speak with the voice of the King. Now, Come."

she released Byakuya's hand, spun on her heels and swept into the Senkaimon as a pair of dragonflies flitted into the gate ahead of them. Silently, Byakuya followed her lead.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

The High King's Sky Palace was made of white stone and the entirety of the Palace was laced with fine webwork of sekiseki stone. Of course, the Sky Palace was less of a fortress and more of the Palace that was called and the sekiseki stone was not a part of the walls in the truest sense but rather, it was inlaid into the walls and ceilings and floors to form beautiful pictures and the most delicate of filigree. The white of the Sky Palace was not a dull monochromatic white, but was actually composed of the palest imaginable colors, as close to white as possible without actually loosing its hue. The colors shifted and swirled in mezmerizing patterns, shifting and flowing, and giving the most delicate of color and shimmers to the carvings and murals on the wall, giving them depth and bringing them to life. High above them arced magnificent stained glass domes and the glass ceilings were held up by frames of the rarest dark colored sekiseki stone. The floors contained beautiful mosaics of precious stones, sliced so thin as to be thinner than a sheet of paper and laid into a cement of the purest calcite, forming family crests and division symbols and simple yet captivating patterns. There were indoor balconies, and fountains that threw colored water into the air and sweeping staircases and indoor rivers cleverly hidden so one could hear them and catch passing glimpses of the water flowing into little creeks where multicolored fish darted about in forests of marine plants. There were beautiful indoor gardens under high glass roofs so vast and teeming with wildlife that one coul almost believe that one was outside in the natural world.

Everywhere there was people walking, talking, woring, relaxing, sparring, fetching and carrying and delivering messages. Some wore the shihakushou of the Royal Guards and some did not, but all wore the red mantles of the Royal Guard and under it, the white mantle of their former Captaincy in the Gotei 13. Only those who wore full uniforms were armed, a startling difference from Seireitei where all had gone armed at all times. For all that the Sky Palace was a fortress of war, it was very much a Palace built in times of peace, and a sense of calm and contentment permeated everything.

All too soon, however, the unnamed Royal Guard and Byakuya passed out of the magnificent halls and wings into a part of the Palace that was very much a cold, monochromatic white, where everything was made of the finest, purest, white sekiseki stone, and the only decoration was cream colored stone inlaid into the walls to form doorways and lotuses of pure white quartz were set into the walls near the ceiling, and they gave off a cold white light. Here, there were only solemn faced and hard eyed Guards in full uniform, and the silence was cold and oppressing. This was the part of the Sky Palace that showed that despite it's magnificence, the Sky Palace was a fortress of war first and foremost.

The Royal Guards took no notice of the two who passed them, and Byakuya's guide led him ever deeper into the heart of the Sky Palace where the crowds thinned and vanished, and it was only his Guide and Byakuya who walked down a long, silent hall of white sekiseki and cream doorways and quartz lotuses that illuminated the corridor which no longer branched off into different directions. Byakuya swallowed hard as he realized that his guide had at some point, vanished, and he was alone in the silent hall which threw the echoes of his footsteps back at him.

At the end of the hall was a pair of massive silver doors cored with sekiseki stone which swung silently open on well oiled hinges as Byakuya approached and his breath caught in his throat as he sensed and reconized the huge reiryouku pulsing inside the chamber in a slow, steady beat. It had been three hundred years since he had last sensed this particular reiryouku, he could never forget the texture of his particular soul, had longed to feel it flowing over his skin and entertwining with his own spiritual aura in that deep, intimate place of his soul where only his most beloved person could access. Even after three hundred long, excruciating years, he could recognize this reiryouku with a single taste...

He took a shakey step into the cavernous chamber and once he cleared the threshhold, the doors swung shut. He swallowed hard as he took in the figure seated on the white throne on the high dias. Other than the golden mantle and the much, much longer hair, he looked no different from the day that he'd last seen him. Kurosaki Ichigo. The High King of Seireitei.

"Do you, Kuchiki Byakuya," the King's voice, though quiet, echoed through the cavernous chamber, "You stand before Us today to become one of Our Royal Guards. Do you hearby swear to adhere to the laws of your King, to obey without fail, to forever be loyal and to Protect your King and his abode for ever as long as may be?"

"I, Kuchiki Byakuya, do so swear," Byakuya said. It was remarkably difficult to say his part of the oath when there was so many other things he wanted to say swirling about in his mind.

"I, Kurosaki Ichigo, High King of Seireitei, do so swear to be a just King, to reward loyalty with glory and betrayal with cruel death. Welcome, Kuchiki Byakuya, to the ranks of the Royal Guards."

Byakuya bowed low, and when he rose, was surprised to find that the King was no longer on the dias.

"It has been a long time, hasn't it?"

Byakuya spun around to find Ichigo staring at him with sharp, wine colored eyes.

"Can you forgive me for what I did to you?" he whispered.

Byakuya swallowed hard and nodded. Wine colored eyes brightened, and Byakuya suddenly found his back pressed against the dias, warm lips on his own, and then Byakuya was returning the kiss, pouring three hundred years of love and longing into the kiss. He reveled in the spicy tang of Ichigo's soul flowing over his skin, and relished the sensation of their reiryouku meshing and binding them together, connecting them as they had been connected in the days before the ginger haired shinigami had left to fight Aizen and become Seireitei's High King. After three hundred years of seperation, things were finally right, and Byakuya couldn't be happier.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~

owari


End file.
